RICK B. SPIELMAN, Ph.D.Dr. Rick Spielman is a corporate Vice President and head of Ktech’s Pulsed Power Division. Dr. Spielman spent 21 years at Sandia National Laboratories (SNL) as project leader, department manager, and chief scientist for ‘Z,’ the world’s largest pulsed-power driver for fast Z-pinch implosions. This project was successfully completed at SNL in 1996. Dr. Spielman was the key member of the research team that developed both the Z-pinch loads and the X-ray energy and power diagnostics, and was the principal scientist in developing the double post-hole vacuum convolute, which enabled the combination of multiple levels of vacuum transmission lines into a single line feeding a Z-pinch load that is used on Z.
Following his career at SNL, Dr. Spielman joined Ktech in 2005. As Vice President of the Pulsed Power Division, he leads the largest pulsed power workforce in the nation, supporting many of the largest, most complex projects in the world. He manages the Engineering Design; Applied Physics and Testing; Pulsed Power Technologies; Pulsed Power Operations, Maintenance and Engineering; and Special Projects Departments and the Materials Processing and Coatings Laboratory.
Dr. Spielman holds a Ph.D. in Plasma Physics from the University of California, Davis.
DONALD J. SULLIVAN, Ph.D.Dr. Donald Sullivan is a corporate Vice President and head of Ktech’s Directed Energy Division. Dr. Sullivan has over 30 years experience on active duty with the Air Force and in industry. His area of expertise is numerical simulation and analysis of particle beams as related to microwave generation, collective ion acceleration, and accelerator design. Dr. Sullivan also has experience in designing particle beam diagnostics utilizing radiation transport codes, and has studied high intensity laser-plasma interactions, and the laser beat wave accelerator. His research includes work on the vircator, transverton, acceletron and classified high power microwave (HPM) and ultra wideband (UWB) sources (all of which he invented) and their applications.
Dr. Sullivan joined Ktech in June 2006 as Manager of the Pulsed Power Technologies Department. In 2010, he was promoted to Vice President of the Directed Energy Division. He is responsible for technical oversight of both DoD and DoE programs in the areas of pulsed power development and Directed Energy.
Dr. Sullivan holds a Ph.D. in Chemical/Nuclear Engineering from the University of New Mexico, a M.S. in Planetary Science from California Institute of Technology, and a B.S. in Physics and Mathematics from Manhattan College.
Mr. Mitchke joined Poly-Flow Engineering in 2006 to help the capital equipment manufacturing arm of Ktech Corporation improve operations, control quality, and increase profit. Under Mitchke’s leadership in 2007, Poly-Flow Engineering grew nearly 100% selling products to the semiconductor manufacturing industry and swung from a substantial loss in 2006 to a significant profit. During April of 2008, Poly-Flow Engineering closed the asset purchase of a competitor’s capital equipment division adding four products and substantial market share in a key semiconductor niche. During June of 2008, Mitchke concluded an arrangement with Ktech Corporation that resulted in Poly-Flow Engineering adding the operations of Ktech Corporation’s metal machine and fabrication shop. Poly-Flow Engineering achieved its initial ISO 9001:2000 registration under his leadership in December of 2008.
Mitchke completed his MBA at the University of Notre Dame during 1995 with emphasis in both Finance and International Business and holds a Bachelor’s of Science in Electrical Engineering with minors in Physics and Computer Science from Gonzaga University.